Is it that time already? It seems like only twelve months ago that I was assembling my favourite albums of 2009 into some sort of order, for reasons which always seem to escape me. This doesn’t get any easier, especially when so many labels have been keeping such a strong curatorial hand on the tiller – the likes of Type, Important, Touch, Thrill Jockey, Pan, Olde English Spelling Bee, Tompkins Square, Not Not Fun, Room40, and Honest Jons have all had years to remember, even if it seems a little hazy already from my point of view. Maybe I’m just getting a little misty-eyed now. For on both a musical, and a personal level, 2010 has been a pretty special year. Thanks to all those friends, tweeters, and readers for making it so, as well as to all those in the exhausting roll call below (you can also see the collective wisdom of The Liminal team over here).
1. Keith Fullerton Whitman, Disingenuity/Disingenuousness (Pan): After a relatively quite couple of years, the sounds of Keith Fullerton Whitman’s modular synth completely filled 2010. More than just being another great KFW release, this gorgeous slab of vinyl was an homage to his heroes, a distillation of 50 years of electronic music into just under forty minutes. Full review
2. Richard Skelton, Landings (Type): It seems almost unfair to include this on a list of albums, for this was so much more. Richard Skelton’s Landings Diaries elevated this into a compelling study of grief and renewal, achieved in collusion with the landscapes and ruined farmhouses of the Pennine moors. A remarkable achievement, even by Skelton’s remarkable standards. Full review
3. Philip Jeck, An Ark For The Listener (Touch): Jeck’s rumination on a stanza from Gerard Manley Hopkins’s “The Wreck of the Deutchsland” may have marked a return to familiar themes after his involvement in a version of The Sinking Of The Titanic, but the depth was greater. On An Ark For The Listener he was (w)ringing some crackly recordings of bells for all they were worth, summoning the all of water. Full review
4. Rangers, Suburban Tours (Olde English Spelling Bee): The Olde English Spelling Bee label was really on it this year, whatever the hell “it” actually was. On Suburban Tours, Joe Knight taped 80s FM pop and funk to mangled cassettes and took them for a cruise around his native San Francisco. This strange, wholly other sound transported you somewhere totally alien. Full review
5. Oval, O (Thrill Jockey): In the ten (ten!) years that have passed since his last full-length release, Markus Popp has deconstructed his musical approach to the point where all that are left are these tiny, sparkling shards of pure sound. On his new double album O he arranged these fastidiously into tight little rhythmic constructions, to dazzling effect. Welcome back. Full review
6. Eleh, Location Momentum (Touch): Oh please, compiling this list is hard enough without making me choose which record to include by the mysterious master of analogue drone, Eleh (his new ones on Important, perhaps thankfully, have arrived too late). His first CD was released, appropriately enough, by those sonic obsessives over at Touch, and tickled the ears in all the right places. Full review
7. Chris Abrahams, Play Scar (Room40): In which synthesizers, a ruined old church organ and a Hammond all fall under the spell, and the fingers of Necks pianist Abrahams. This is a far more diverse and more intricate set than you’d expect given his role in that most minimalist of piano trios: the track “Twig Blown” even shows off some impressive musique concrete chops. Full review
8. Mark Fell, Multistability (Raster-Noton): On Multistability, Fell (one half of Sheffield’s SND) exploited the contrasts between different electronic rhythms, tempos and textures, producing an album that confused and disorientated as much as it excited and fascinated. It sounded like nothing else this year, least of all his own simultaneously released UL8 album for eMego. Full review
9. Demdike Stare, Voices Of Dust (Modern Love): The closing part of their excellent 2010 trilogy contained possibly its most ecstatic moment in “Hashshashin Chant”, but also some of its darkest, as evidenced by track titles like “Of Decay And Shadows” and “Rain And Shame”. Miles Whittaker and Sean Canty’s journey into otherness just keeps getting blacker, stranger, and better.
10. Clang Sayne, Winterlands (Clang Sayne): My favourite band working out on the lightly-patrolled frontier between classic-sounding folk song and improvised jazz/noise, this album from Laura Hylands’s Clang Sayne project managed to be both lyrically affecting and musically exciting. A thrillingly ragged and raw-sounding debut which promises much for the 2011 follow-up. Full review
11. Joanna Newsom, Have One On Me (Drag City) Full review
12. Evan Caminiti, West Winds (Three Lobed) Full review
13. Autechre, Oversteps (Warp) Full review
14. Mats Gustafsson, Needs! (Dancing Wayang) Full review
15. Emeralds, Does It look Like I’m Here (Editions Mego) Full review
16. Jefre Cantu-Ledesma, Love Is A Stream (Type) Full review
17. Pan Sonic, Gravitoni (Blast First Petite) Full review
18. Supersilent, 10 (Rune Grammofon) Full review
19. Forest Swords, Dagger Paths (Olde English Spelling Bee) Full review
20. Pausal, Lapses (Barge) Full review
And the next twenty:
Celer, Pockets Of Wheat (Soundscaping); Oneohtrix Point Never, Returnal (Editions Mego); Akira Rabelais, Caduceus (Samadhisound); Joseph Hammer, I Love You Please Love Me Too (Pan); Lobi Traore, Rainy Season Blues (Glitterhouse); Barn Owl, Ancestral Star (Thrill Jockey); A Broken Consort, Crow Autumn (Tompkins Square); TVO/The Village Orchestra, We Can Remember It For You Wholesale (Broken20); Solo Andata, Ritual (Desire Path Recordings); Ensemble Economique, Standing Still Facing Forward (Amish); Chicago Underground Duo, Boca Negra (Thrill Jockey); Group Inerane, Guitars From Agadez Vol. 3 (Sublime Frequencies); Pekko Kappi, Vuonno 86 (Singing Knives); Marcus Fjellstrom, Schattenspieler (Miasmah); Marina Rosenfeld, Plastic Materials (Room40); Sun Araw, On Patrol (Not Not Fun); Fenn O’Berg, In Stereo (Editions Mego); Nicholas Szczepanik, Dear Dad (Basses Frequencies); James Blackshaw, All Is Falling (Young God); Piiptsjilling, Wurdskrieme (Experimedia); The Ex Guitars Meet Ken Vandermark / Paal Nilsen-Love, Lean Left Volume 1 (Smalltown Superjazzz)
11 comments
December 18, 2010 at 12:20 pm
nickinko
Great list! This blog is by far the one that most closely intersects with (and influences) my own tastes these days
I keep meaning to check out that Rangers album, I love its cover.
Mine will be something like this…
1) Joanna Newsom – Have One On Me
2) Demdike Stare – Forest Of Evil / Liberation Through Hearing / Voices Of Dust
3) Machinefabriek – Slovensko / Nerf / The Breathing Bridge / De Jonge Jaren / Music For Studies / Daas / Kilauea (with Freiband) / Drifts (as L / M / R / W) / Duotoon / Drape (with Gareth Davis) / Halfslaap / Toendra / Vloed version 2.0 / Wurdskrieme (as Piiptsjilling) / Par Avion (with Ithaca Trio) / The Hilary Jefferey Tape
4) Autechre – Oversteps / Move Of Ten EP
5) Philip Jeck – An Ark For The Listener
6) Coldstream – South Island LP /Alarums EP
7) Chihei Hatakeyama – A Long Journey / Ghostly Garden / The Secret Distance Of TOCHKA / Variations
8) Excepter – Presidence / LATE + Tank Tapes
9) Yellow Swans – Going Places / Being There & Pete Swanson – Challenger / Ghost O Clock / Where I Was / Feelings In America) / Waiting For The Ladies (with Rene Hell)
10) Keith Fullerton Whitman + Geoff Mullen – November 28 2009 / Keith Fullerton Whitman – Generator / Keith Fullerton Whitman – Variations For Oud & Synthesizer / Keith Fullerton Whitman with Mike Shiflet – Split / Disingenuity / Hallicrafters, Inc
11) Gultskra Artikler – Galaktika
12) Menomena – Mines
13) Pantha Du Prince – Black Noise
14) Richard Skelton – Landings / Clouwbeck – From Which The River Rises
15) Natural Snow Buildings – The Centauri Agent / TwinSisterMoon – Then Fell The Ashes
16) Kyle Bobby Dunn – A Young Person’s Guide
17) Lee Noble – Infinity Bore / Darker Half / Our Star, The Sun / Loaded Image
18) Christopher Hipgrave – Slow With Pages Of Fluttering Interference
19) Michael Santos – Memory Maker
20) Goldmund – Famous Places
21) Solo Andata – Ritual
22) The North Sea – Bloodlines
23) Scuba – Transfiguration
24) Concern – Caesarean LP
25) Forest Swords – Dagger Paths / Rattling Cage EP
26) The Books – The W ay Out
27) Library Tapes – Like Green Grass Against A Blue Sky
28) Nos Phillipe – Nos Phillipe EP / Shh…Camille
29) Relmic Statute – Morning Tapes
30) Taylor Deupree – Snow (Dusk, Dawn) / Shoals
31) Will Thomas Long – Sequoia / Celer – Dying Star / Panoramic Dreams Bathed In Seldomness / Hell Detoured / All At Once Is What Eternity Is / Pockets Of Wheat
32) anbb – Ret Marut Handshake / Mimikry
33) Andrew Pekler – Entanglements In The Orthopedic Sensorium
34) Rafael Anton Irisarri – Reverie / The North Bend LP
35) Grouper & Roy Montgomery – Split / Grouper – Hold / Sick 7”
36) Mark Fell – Multistability
37) Benoit Pioulard – Lasted
38) Fabio Orsi – Winterreise / Random Shades Of Day
39) Simon Scott – Traba
40) Giuseppe Ielasi – Tools / 15Tapes
Also liked stuff from Brian McBride, Avey Tare, David Thomas Broughton, Mount Kimbie, Kemialliset Ystavat, Max Richter, Scott Tuma, Ian Hawgood, Wreaths, Emeralds, Svarte Greiner, Alva Noto, Eleh, Oval, Chris Abrahams, Greg Haines, Seaworthy & Matt Rosner, offthesky and The Fun Years.
December 18, 2010 at 9:41 pm
Albums of the Year 2010 « Bubblegum Cage III
[...] Cybore Me The Original Soundtrack The Quietus Optimistic Underground Blissblog Tiny Mix Tapes Mapsadaisical Nothing else yet. Check back [...]
December 18, 2010 at 9:44 pm
Biggie Samuels
Great list, as ever. Nice to see someone recognizing the Oval record!
December 19, 2010 at 10:14 pm
Sheq
As always, illuminating.
December 21, 2010 at 12:31 am
j.
oh, wow, i had not heard ‘disingenuity/disingenuousness’—thanks so much.
December 22, 2010 at 9:12 am
themilkman
A fine selection, as usual, and I’ve got quite a few to discover from it. I really want to check the KFW album out as I really like some of his old stuff. Vinyls are just so unpractical for me to listen to though which is a shame.
I do have to thank you for bringing Chris Abrahams to my attention, it scored pretty well on my end of the year list too. For me though, the year has been dominated by Rune Grammofon. The label is one of my favourite, as I’m sure you’ve noticed, but this year’s been particularly exquisite in term of the music they have put out. You rightly predicted I would love Supersilent 10, and I did, or, I do, and probably will for a very long time, but the albums released by Stian Westerhus and Phonophani have also blown me away completely.
Looking back, I think 2010 has been a pretty good year indeed.
December 24, 2010 at 6:26 pm
5:4
Hate to break it to you: Landings was a 2009 release.
December 24, 2010 at 6:47 pm
mapsadaisical
I hate to break it to you: it wasn’t a 2009 release according to Type. Official release date was Jan 2010. If you count being available on one format (LP) in one shop (Boomkat) for the last 2 weeks in 2009 as meaning it was a 2009 release, when otherwise it was released in 2010, I think you are being a bit over-officious.
December 24, 2010 at 8:05 pm
5:4
Not trying to be officious, just accurate; it was a 2009 release on both vinyl and CD; Skelton self-released it at the start of December. Type didn’t start handling it until much later.
On a less finicky note, your list – once again – is a very interesting one, so thanks!
December 24, 2010 at 10:17 pm
mapsadaisical
I still disagree. Skelton had 100 copies on CD in mid (not early) December. Boomkat had it on LP. Big deal. The full, proper release was in January. Really, would you rather I took it out of the list? I don’t understand why. I mean lets face it, it wasn’t in many 2009 lists.
December 26, 2010 at 4:49 pm
5:4
Apart from my own list ;)
Anyway, happy to agree to disagree – it’s *such* a good release, it deserves to be on as many lists as possible!